Abstract

Lincoln persistently and effectively uses a number of "dialectical" or "dialogical" figures such as prolepsis, prosopopoeia, and correctio. These figures help to frame his rhetorical texts within a universe of argument and give him the opportunity to voice and transcend positions that differ from his own. Attention to this aspect of Lincoln's rhetoric helps to explain the power of his speeches and also offers a ground for connecting rhetorical practice with contemporary scholarship in informal logic, where there is an especially keen interest in the dialectical positioning of arguments.

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